Weekend Miscellany

Oh dear… well, it is still the weekend. But I’ve been busy planning a murder mystery party, so that’s my excuse for not blogging earlier! And great fun it was too – we played it out this evening, set in a cake shop called For Goodness Cake! (aka our lounge) and gave me an excuse to splurge on a beautiful tiered cake stand, which I’m show off soon. And I already had a beautiful non-tiered cake stand… I may be developing an obsession.

Anyway, I wrote a murder with nine parts, all unisex so they could be distributed randomly, and I think it worked quite well. Lots of fantastic acting going on all round! Great fun – and all to celebrate my housemate Debs’ birthday. The present I gave her was, of course, books… some gems I found in Malvern. I thought I’d give her books I’d loved, and hope for the best – so she got rather lovely old copies of The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim, Mrs. Miniver by Jan Stuther, and the Collected Short Stories of Saki.

Anyway, enough of my news – let’s leap towards the book, blog post, and link. Not much colour this weekend, as that’s the bit which takes the most time, and I need to sleep…

1.) The link – comes courtesy of Nancy, thanks Nancy – fancy living in the house in Rye which has housed E.F. Benson, Henry James, and Rumer Godden? (Not all at the same time, you understand…) Well, you can rent it! I can’t believe this is true, and wish I had the money and the desired ability to garden… I’d love it if a SiaB reader got the gig. Have a look here.

2.) The blog post – is Simon S’s very interesting post on blog commenting. Some people find blogging-about-blogging (meta-blogging, if you will) tiresome, some find it fascinating – I am one of those who finds it fascinating, and could read about it all day. The ways people go about it, the decisions they make, etc. etc…. so interesting. And so I’ve enjoyed everyone’s thoughts on commenting on blogs. And apologise once again for my laxness in replying to comments – Must Do Better.

3.) The book – I spent much of today reading The Uncanny by Nicholas Royle. When a publisher told me they were issuing his novel Quilt, and would I like a copy, I thought – gosh, how uncanny (ahem). And said yes. And it sounds right up my street – here’s the blurb:Facing the disarray and disorientation around his father’s death, a man contends with the strange and haunting power of the house his parents once lived in.

He sets about the mundane yet exhausting process of sorting through the remnants of his father’s life – clearing away years of accumulated objects, unearthing forgotten memories and the haunted realms of everyday life. At the same time, he embarks on an eccentric side-project. And as he grows increasingly obsessed with this new project, his grip on reality seems to slip.It sounds like a combination of things I’ve loved in novels by Edward Carey and Stephen Benatar, as well as reminding me of ‘Daughters of the Late Colonel’ by Katherine Mansfield… and utterly irresistible. I think it may form part of a little project I’m intending to undertake next weekend, which I’ll tell you about soon…

As promised, I won’t leave you without a book, a blog post, a link. And I should have time to create a post about the books I’m taking on holiday…

1.) The book – is Remember, Remember by Hazel McHaffie, which the author recently sent me for review. McHaffie is an expert in medical ethics, but turns her hand to fiction-writing with this novel about a lady with Alzheimer’s and her daughter… and family secrets being unearthed. Sounds really intriguing, and has a lovely cover to boot.

2.) The link – I’m spoiling you; there are two, because one of them might only be available in the UK. Thanks Carol N for mentioning this link to a BBC documentary about literary editor and memoirist Diana Athill called ‘Growing Old Disgracefully’. And thanks abebooks for doing a fun feature on 75 Years of Penguin. Plenty to keep you amused there… (photo credit)

3.) The blog post – is my Mum/Our Vicar’s Wife/Anne’s blog, which I don’t mention enough here. Go and be welcomed to July by Mum with this post! It’s a Windows Live Spaces blog, so commenting might be tricky, but *hopefully* viewing is possible for all…

My best laid plans to type out a week’s worth of reviews this evening have rather crumbled and fallen. Instead, I did my ironing, baked a cake, and watched soap operas online. I feel a little like a 1950s housewife… but I’ve read/seen The Hours and I know how that ends.

Off to a wedding tomorrow, should be fun – and will hopefully avoid dancing. As Mary Bennett once said before me, “I should infinitely prefer a book.” And, had she found her way to Stuck-in-a-Book, she’d get even more than that: a book, a blog post, and a link. Don’t say I don’t spoil you.

1.) The book – I was wondering to myself what else Nicola Humble might have written, except the very Simon-friendly The Feminine Middlebrow Novel 1920s to 1950s (see more here) and came across this rather winning title: Cake: A Global History. It’s advertised on Amazon as Cake: A Global History (Edible) which I thought was an exceptionally clever gimmick, but turns out Edible is the name of the publishing company. Basically it looks like it does what it says on the tin – a history of cake! What’s not to like?

2.) The link – is to an Oxfam Bookfest. Includes a day-long readathon… Click the link to find out more.

3.) The blog post – I’m a sucker for so-I-went-bookshopping sorts of posts (especially since I’ve been on rations myself) so hive on over to Thomas at My Porch and his latest spree…

By the time this comes up on Blogger… well, hopefully I’ll be tucked up in bed, but chances are I’ll be on the way back from a birthday dinner in London. That’s right, the Big City three times within a week – I’m quite literally hip and happening. But not too hip for a book, a blog post, and a link…

Before I do that – please note that you can now search my reviews by decade of first publication! It took ages, so I hope *someone* uses it…(!) Have a look in the left hand column, and there’s a drop-down menu for it… also for publisher, but there I’ve only included a select few of favourites whose names are synonymous with certain types of book – i.e. not the big publishers, who are also wonderful but publish many different sorts of thing…

1.) The book – arrived through the letter box this morning, to my happy surprise. It’s a new OUP edition of Cousin Phillis and other stories by Elizabeth Gaskell, which is rather lovely – thanks OUP! I reviewed Cousin Phyllis (sans other stories) back here, during I Love Hesperus Week – and I assume the ‘y’ instead of an ‘i’ doesn’t denote a different book? Gaskell is a really good short story writer, as well as novelist, so I encourage you to go and explore…

2.) The link – came courtesy of my very good friend Lorna, who saw it and thought of me… Here it is. It’s not book-related, but it does concern the other burning passion in my life… (and, no, I don’t mean Neighbours. Or even, unfortunately, Jesus. It’s cake I’m talking about.)

3.) The blog post – is from the rather lovely Rachel at Book Snob, and her rather lovely thoughts brought about by her first blog birthday. If you’re not feeling warm and fuzzy after reading that, then you must be lying in a bath of ice, drinking iced tea, and wearing a penguin for a bonnet.

Happy weekend, folks – my brother is staying, so hopefully lots of fun will be had. Tomorrow night I’m off to see The Real Inspector Hound by Tom Stoppard, which I loved about a decade ago and am hoping to love once more. Colin, given the option of seeing this or going to a friend’s house, revealed his culture-vulture nature and chose the latter. Twins, eh?

For those awaiting a round-up of The Vet’s Daughter reviews, I think I’m going to wait ’til Monday, because there are one or two in the pipeline… instead, let’s go for a book, a blog post, and a link.

1.) The book – isn’t out yet, but I’m looking forward to it (and hoping maybe one will come for review… *puppy-dog eyes*) – one of the new Bloomsbury Group reprints, Mrs. Ames by E.F. Benson, as recommended by Elaine at Random Jottings. I like the new colours they’ve picked, and applaud anything and everything to do with this series. AND was chuffed to see myself quoted in their new catalogue…

2.) The blog post – is not quite new, but it took me a week to get over my jealousy… here is Naomi (aka Bloomsbury Bell) and her account of the Charleston Literary Festival. I’m not an especial fan of Carol Ann Duffy (indeed, I have read a total of one poem by her) but I am a fan of lawns and chairs and cake…

3.) The link(s) – courtesy of my online book group, who have pointed me in the direction of 50 Crime Writers To Read Before You Die (an odd stipulation… how many will we read after we die? Then again, I really hope there are books in Heaven) and a link about some very fancy books to be sold at Sotheby’s. Thanks Sherry and Curzon!

Also, I made a map of Oxford bookshops for a friend who’ll be visiting soon, which I thought I’d share with you all, in case you’re ever here… Long-term readers of Stuck-in-a-Book will remember my Stuck-in-a-Book’s Oxford photo tour in three parts (gosh, three years ago). I’m planning on doing another one at some point soon. But here’s something to whet the appetite (it’s very small, but hopefully readable if you click on it? Otherwise email me and I’ll send you a copy):

Happy Weekend, everyone – and, for those in the UK, it’s a Bank Holiday Weekend. Which makes little odds to me (especially since I’m at work tomorrow) but will give you lots of time to read Barbara Comyns’ The Vet’s Daughter – for those who are joining in a group readalong, informally organised by me and Polly (aka Novel Insights) and Claire (Paperback Reader). I finished the book today, and thought it was brilliant – feel free to post a review anytime next week (pop a link in the comments, and I’ll organise them together). If you don’t have a blog but have read the book, I’d be more than happy to post your thoughts here.

1.) The link – is to 50 Iconic Book Covers, as chosen by abebooks… not perhaps all ones I’d have chosen, but it’s nice to see them as actual books, rather than just pristine pictures of their covers, don’t you think?

2.) The book – was mentioned by a few people on an email book discussion list I’m on; the new one by Bill Bryson called At Home : A Short History of Private Life. I’ve only read a couple of his books (Mother Tongue and Shakespeare) but I loved them both. Bryson is able to relay all manner of fascinating facts without ever sounding dry, and his sense of humour is a delight. To give you an idea about the sort of thing Bryson’s doing, I’ll quote the Author’s section from Amazon: Early in the course of my research for my new book I learned that houses are amazingly complex repositories. What I found, to my great surprise, is that whatever happens in the world – whatever is discovered or created or bitterly fought over – eventually ends up, in one way or another, in your house.

Wars, famines, the Industrial Revolution, the Enlightenment – they are all there in your sofas and chests of drawers, tucked in to the folds of your curtains, in the downy softness of your pillows, in the paint on your walls and the water in your pipes.

Houses aren’t refuges from history, as I hope you are about to discover in At Home. They are where history ends up. So there you are – irresistible to me, I think I might have to wait til the library gets it. Or perhaps it’ll come in at no.11 in Project 24? Tempting…

3.) The blog post – is from Claire at kissacloud, and is here. It’s about Illustrado by Miguel Syjuco, a Filipino author of whom I hadn’t heard, but am now very eager to read. But it also opens up a wider question, specifically for those who have emigrated – do you try and stay in touch with your birth-nation (if such an expression exists!) through literature? As someone who was born and bred in England, I can’t answer the question – but on a regionalist note, I do get excited if a book mentions Worcestershire, since nobody seems ever to do so…

Well, I had my viva and I don’t really know how it went… some positives, quite a few negatives – I suppose I’ll find out a fortnight on Monday, and will keep you posted! But there’s nothing I can do about it now… so let’s think about the book, the blog post, & the link instead…

1.) The blog post – is, once again, an entire blog. Hey, I made the rules and I can break them if I want to (!) The blog in question is one I stumbled upon by accident when trying to find out when the French market is next coming to Gloucester Green. I didn’t manage to find out that information (answers on a postcard, please) but I did find Oxford Daily Photo. It does what it says on the tin – for the last three or four years they’ve been posting daily photographs of Oxford and Oxfordshire, the latest being this rather lovely shot:

2.) The link – was emailed to me by Lauréne on behalf of the PR firm representing Munch Bunch. Don’t worry, I’m not being paid to advertise them or anything – but I did want to share this link which is to a storytelling-for-children competition they’re running. I.e. it’s for adults who write children’s stories, and will give them a chance to be published online or via podcast. All a bit of fun, and any company keen to promote reading to children gets a sticker on their sticker chart from me.

3.) The book – was sent to me by my lovely friend Epsie. Well, she’s known as either Esther or Phoebe, so I just combined the two. In turn, she knows me as Bill – because of the beautiful name of my birthplace: Billinge. Sounds a bit like a disease, but I’m sure it’s lovely – even if they have now knocked down the hospital where we were born. Typical. (Not sure of what)

The book, which she correctly assumed would be up my street, is called Joy Street: A Wartime Romance in Letters by Mirren Barford and Lieutenant John Lewes. I like to have a book of letters on the go, and this collection (discovered after Mirren’s death by her son, and edited by him) seems touching as well as historically interesting. Joy Street was published back in 1995, so I’m going to assume that at least *one* of you has read it…?

Well, after promising my return yesterday, I was out late last night at my church small group, and somehow slumping in front of a soap opera took precedence over writing a proper book review. Apologies… And for those keeping tabs on the state of all things technological chez Stuck-in-a-Book, the current score is Laptop: 1, iPod: 0. Yes, in a fit of pique, my iPod won’t turn on, and none of the usual methods of fixing it seem to work. It did this a while ago and just started working again after a while, so fingers crossed… or I might have to go without new shoes for a while.

For those who know things about computers, unlike me, I opted for a Compaq CQ61-427SA. Goodness knows what that means, but it’s nice and shiny.

Right. Enough of that – as we all know, computers are just a means to an end, and that end is books. So let’s get on with the book, the blog post, the link…

1.) The book – is Stephen Benatar’s Wish Her Safe At Home, which my friend’s family gave me (yes, I did *choose* it, but that doesn’t count as me *buying* it). I read an article about this novel in The Week magazine, which was reprinting this article from The Times, I believe. As well as sounding irresistible from this description – ‘a gripping and haunting story about a middle-aged, genteel woman called Rachel Waring who inherits a Georgian house in Bristol and slowly goes mad’ – I was also impressed by Benatar’s tireless and heartfelt promotion of the novel. And, let’s face it, I was won over by the ever-beautiful NYRB Classics editions. I’m not on their payroll, but I should be…

2.) The blog post – isn’t especially new now, but I was sans laptop for over a week, and in the blogosphere a week is a long time. So cast your minds back to the 5th May, those heady days before the election, and wander over to Polly (aka Novel Insights) and this post on forgotten authors. More specifically – and even more up my street – Polly has collected suggestions of novels by authors more famous for their work for children. That’s a bit of a mouthful, but I hope you know what I mean. Novels by authors known for their children’s writing. Not writing by their children, but… oh, I’m sure we’re on the same page now. It’s no secret that I love non-children’s work by A.A. Milne and Richmal Crompton, but there are plenty of others. In fact, I wrote A Level coursework on the topic, now I think of it… ahh, memories.

3.) The link – is the one for which I can never think of anything… but this YouTube video is quite funny. Oh, they seem to have removed the import-videos-into-Blogger function, but you can see it if you click here. It’s David Mitchell (the comedian, not the novelist) on the topic of Punctuation. Thanks Mel for showing it to me!

This week’s miscellany comes to you on a Saturday morning, because I was a dirty stop-up last night, and didn’t get back from London until about 2am. What *would* my mother say. Whilst in London, I had the very great pleasure of dinner with the lovely Claire (Paperback Reader) and the equally lovely Teresa (one half of Shelf Love – a pun it took me two years to get). Teresa was over visiting from the US of A – a brief discussion ensued which revealed my total lack of geographical knowledge about the US; thank goodness we didn’t start on the counties of England – and it was very nice to meet her, and see Claire again – thanks guys! When we left each other, we went to the extremes of the cultural spectrum. They went to see Macbeth at the Globe; I went with my friend Phil (also responsible for my blog feed appearing on Twitter, thanks Phil!) to see The Room: ‘The Best Worst Film Ever Made’. It’s written, directed, and starred in by Tommy Wiseau, a man without any discernible talent – unless unquashable self-belief is a talent. They hold screenings for people to mock it – and the cinema was sold out. Audience Participation includes:
Throwing plastic spoons at the screen whenever a framed picture of a spoon appears. Which they do. A lot. There were literally hundreds, probably thousands, of spoons.Shouting ‘Meanwhile, in San Francisco’ whenever another shot of San F appears.Shouting ‘Hello, Denny!’ and ‘Bye, Denny!’ whenever said character enters or leaves a room.Shouting ‘Who the heck are you?’ when a character is replaced half-way through the film by another actor, who looks nothing like the first guy.Mocking the film’s misogyny by shouting ‘because you’re a woman’ at the end of many and various lines of dialogue.One character says how much he likes ‘The candles, the music, and your sexy dress.’ None of these things are in the scene – so, naturally, it provokes the united audience reaction “What candles? What music? What sexy dress?”Joining in with this particular scene…etc. etc. etc.!
So, yes, lots of shouting. And not remotely literary. But one of the most fun evenings I’ve had for a while…

Oh dear, I’ve just got distracted by looking up The Room on Wikipedia, and then reading interviews and articles about it… when instead I should be telling you about a book, a blog post, and a link…

1.) The blog post – is over at Cornflower Books, where Karen is trying to create a profile for the ‘typical’ reader of her blog, by asking three questions… go and answer, it’s fun!

2.) The book – arrived yesterday, courtesy of Hayley at Desperate Reader, as I won it in a competition. Thanks Hayley! It’s Andrina and other stories by George Mackay Brown. I’m always on the look-out for more short stories, and keen to read more Scottish writers too, so I’m intrigued by this one. Despite my love of some short story writers, somehow I hardly ever get around to reading collections – I’ll make sure I do better with this one. Read what Hayley had to say about the book here.

3.) The link – I’m afraid I haven’t come across anything notable and bookish this week. So, on the off-chance that you’re still intrigued by The Room… click here.

And don’t forget that Persephone Reading Week kicks off on Monday… I just hope you haven’t been foolish and scheduled in Jude the Obscure for the same week…

So, my thesis is all handed in, and I’m taking the week off! I’ve amassed an implausibly high tower of books to read this week. I wonder how many I’ll get through – since one of them is Jude the Obscure, I wouldn’t be surprised if the answer is something around ‘one’. There is (as my mother always told me) a time and a place for everything – and Stuck-in-a-Book’s Weekend Miscellany is not the place to tell you all about the books I’ll be reading. Look out for a picture of a tottering pile sometime on Sunday evening… and then you can weigh in and tell me the order in which I should read them.

Where were we? Oh, of course – the ole book, link, blog post malarkey.

1.) The book – is Ellipsis, arrived yesterday, and is a little unusual for these parts inasmuch as it describes itself as ‘a disturbing thriller’. But I was intrigued by the blurb, and by the fact that the author (Nikki Dudley) shares her name with a girl who was at my school. I presume it’s not the same person, but that’s because I like to pretend nobody younger than me has achieved big things yet. Anyway, here’s the blurb – it’s not something the Provincial Lady would read, but perhaps intriguing enough to make a change?

“Right on time,” Daniel Mansen mouths to Alice as she pushes him to his death. Haunted by these words, Alice becomes obsessed with discovering how a man she didn’t know could predict her actions. On the day of the funeral, Daniels’ cousin, Thom, finds a piece of paper in Daniel’s room detailing the exact time and place of his death. As Thom and Alice both search for answers, they become knotted together in a story of obsession, hidden truths and the gaps in everyday life that can destroy or save a person.
I feel a little on edge just typing that… let’s move onto a link.

2.) The link(s) – University Reviews Online keep emailing me, and at first I thought it was spam but now it looks like not. Persistance should be rewarded, should it not, so here is their link to 10 Important Writers Who Went To Jail For Their Work. Off the top of my head I can think of one (Oscar Wilde – yes, it was for ‘immoral thought’ in Dorian Gray not for, erm, anything else) but he doesn’t make the list… and in fact I’ve not heard of any of them, but interesting nonetheless.

A few other bits and bobs to put under this umbrella, playing fast and loose with the normal arrangement of these weekend miscellanies…

—A new website called Books & Media has been set up by BDS: ‘a new web-based subscription service for anyone who wants to know what the media is saying about books and authors’. There’s a free trial period of two months on at the moment, could be worth a look. I’m not sure how useful this is for readers, as opposed to professionals, but… nice to know books are getting some attention!

—Carte Noire are trying to find their Ideal Reader. Not entirely sure how they’re going about it, and I think – as someone who doesn’t like coffee – I’m unlikely to be it, but there are more details on their website. I got side-tracked by watching celebrities read from the classics – fancy hearing Joseph Fiennes read Thomas Hardy or Dominic West read Pride and Prejudice? Well, there are some rather arty sepia-shots of them doing so (even if Mr. West wrongly states that Jane and Bingley were engaged before Bingley went off to London).

3.) The blog post – Danielle aka A Work in Progress is starting a read-along of Anna Karenina by Mr. Leo Tolstoy (are there two schools of thought on pronunciation of ‘Karenina’, or are my friends just wrong? I’m Kah-ren-ih-nuh all the way, none of this Kah-ruh-nee-nuh nonsense for me). See her first thoughts on it here… I’m tempted to join in, but with my pile of books to read next week… it’ll have to go on hold for now.